I came across an interesting paragraph in Anderson & Taylor's Writing Greek regarding attributive adjectives:

There is however an important caution with the attributive use. In Greek the stupid slave necessarily implies a contrast with e.g. the clever slave: it serves to identify the slave in questions. In English adjectives are often added to nouns more casually, to give colour, or to describe a preson's character or behaviour on a particular occasion (rather than to contrast the person with someone else). In Greek here the adjective would have the present participle of ειμι (ὢν οὖσα ὂν: see Chapter 6) added, or an adverb might be used instead.
The stupid slave stole the wine.
ὁ δοῦλος μῶρος ὢν ἒκλεψε τὸν οἶνον.

Perhaps I am the victim of not being widely read outside of the NT and LXX, but I had never come across this concept before. Does it ring true for others? Are there citations in grammars?

And the translation offered for ὁ δοῦλος μῶρος ὢν ἒκλεψε τὸν οἶνον is inadequate. There's a nuance in the use of the participle that isn't reflected in that rendering. "Because he was stupid the slave stole the wine" or something to that effect is needed.

NathanSmith wrote:Perhaps I am the victim of not being widely read outside of the NT and LXX, but I had never come across this concept before. Does it ring true for others? Are there citations in grammars?

I'd say its pretty bogus. Greek does make formally marked distinctions between descriptive and restrictive adjectives, but that distinction generally involves word order patterns--descriptive adjectives are invariably post-nominal, which restrictive ones may appear before the noun or after the noun. I've also never seen the participle used that way in general. Maybe its a Classical thing, but it isn't Koine.

timothy_p_mcmahon wrote:And the translation offered for ὁ δοῦλος μῶρος ὢν ἒκλεψε τὸν οἶνον is inadequate. There's a nuance in the use of the participle that isn't reflected in that rendering. "Because he was stupid the slave stole the wine" or something to that effect is needed.

No...their translation is perfectly adequate (aside from the fact that its an odd use of the participle). You're reading more into the participle than necessary--for example, τοῖς ἁγίοις τοῖς οὖσιν ἐν Ἐφέσῳ in Ephesians 1:1. The more useful generalization about εἰμὶ as a participle in NPs is that is used for referring entities and participants that are located (or possessed) in some manner:

Like a lot of writing advice, the particular recommendation seems to be poorly generalized. The use of adjectives is more complex than the advice seems to make it. Unfortunately, the only really good advice for composition is to read so much of good models that one begins to internalize their practice.